10 MOVIE VILLAINS WHO WEREN'T ENTIRELY WRONG

 

10 Movie Villains Who Weren’t Entirely Wrong

When you hate the actor for playing a certain character, that is when you know that the said actor is really talented. Throughout the history of cinema we’ve seen so many iconic villains on the big screen such as The Joker, Darth Vader, Lord Voldemort, Anton Chigurh, Hans Landa, etc.

But here is a list of 10 villains who, according to me weren’t entirely wrong for their reason of villainy. A lot of these are superhero movie villains (bear with me).

 

WARNING: SPOILER ALERT

 

11) The Architect – The Matrix

The Matrix is one of the most revered sci fi movies of all time. When it was released, it changed the world and brought out the idea of a ‘simulation’. The sequels to the first movie continued the lore and expanded the Matrix universe, even though each one was progressively worse than its predecessor. And amongst this storyline, stands The Architect, one of the main antagonists of the franchise apart from Agent Smith.

The Architect was a program whose sole purpose, as the name suggests, was to design the Matrix and it’s progression. While he did a pretty decent task, apart from the paint job, there was one place where he failed. Neo. If you haven’t watched the second movie then please do not read any further. As we all saw in the second movie, Neo himself is an intentional part of The Matrix. He is the One who is supposed to prevent the system crash that was bound to happen due to the concept of human choice within it. And in each iteration of the Matrix, The Architect is supposed to provide a choice to Neo: save Trinity and let everyone else die or save a few survivors and repopulate Zion.

I personally feel that The Architect is just doing his job. He doesn’t really have a say in what Neo chooses and must abide by the Matrix’s iterations regardless of whatever he feels. The real villain of the movie was Agent Smith.

 

22) Poison Ivy – Batman & Robin

Okay. I know that this movie is generally considered as one of the worst movies of all time. But Poison Ivy has been around the DC Universe long before this movie’s inception.

The main reason why Dr. Pamela Isley turned to a world of crime was because her work was being used in all the wrong ways. She just wanted to help the green life on earth and nothing more. In a way she was forced to become Poison Ivy due to a lab accident. It was not her choice to be such a deadly person in the first place. Although her acts after becoming Poison Ivy were questionable, she just had a… As the Joker would say ‘one bad day is all it takes’.

 

33) Commodus – Gladiator

Commodus, played by Joaquin Pheonix, is considered as one of the most iconic villains in the history of cinema. And the way Mr. Pheonix embodies the character makes you hate him.

But that wasn’t the case for me. When I watched the movie I didn’t feel hatred toward him, but rather I felt sorry for him. Commodus was not the best king ever, but he wasn’t as bad as you think he was. If anything, the real reason why Commodus turned out the way he did was because of his father Marcus Aurelius. Had he been taught to respect others and not be jealous in his childhood, Maximus’ family would have been alive. All Commodus wanted was his father’s love and respect. Yes, he did kill his father and yes, he did kill Maximus’ family. Those were his only two sins. He was not a bad king. He organized games for the people of Rome, he had much affection for his nephew, his sister, he never disrespected the people of Rome. Had Marcus Aurelius treated him the same way he treated Maximus, Commodus would have never gone down the path of villainy. Unlike other kings in human history, he never deprived his people of anything. He might have been reckless but that is not the main reason to hate him. 

 

44) Magneto – X Men Franchise

Sir Ian McKellen and Mr. Michael Fassbender did an amazing job in portraying the character of Magneto. Whenever he was on screen, he certainly stole the show. He is generally regarded as one of the best Marvel villains of all time. And I dislike it.

Magneto had every reason to be angry at the non mutants. He had seen much horrors committed in his lifetime which led him to believe that Mutants all over the world were being pacified and tortured. All he wanted was equality. Professor X and Magneto had the same goals but while Charles Xavier adopted a diplomatic approach to the situation, Magneto simply decided to use brute force when needed. He has done some questionable acts in his appearances on screen, but he was not pure evil.

 

55) Proximus – Kingdom of The Planet Of The Apes

I honestly could not find a single reason to hate Proximus. Sure, he had a very rude personality but that’s not the reason to treat him like a villain. All he wanted was to evolve. He wasn’t an inherently bad king. He wanted advanced technology for his fellow apes. He was even kind enough to invite the protagonists to dine with him.

At no point in the movie did I feel that he was acting like a typical comic book villain. In fact, if I may be so bold, the protagonists Noa and Mae were the antagonists of the movie. Especially the human girl Mae. She was a constant machine of betrayal who ‘had her own agenda’ as Proximus rightly said. I felt pretty bad when he fell to his death at the end.

 

66)  Mr. Trask – Scent of a Woman

This one might not be a very well-known villain. I can’t really call him a villain too. He’s just the guy playing the negative role in the movie Scent of a Woman. To those of you who don’t remember, Mr. Trask was the school headmaster who got pranked by Philip Seymour Hoffman’s character and his friends.

When I saw that scene of the students pranking Mr. Trask by dowsing his new car in flour, I got a little enraged myself. If that same prank was done to anyone else, they would freak out. Rather, the headmaster actually handled the situation with grace in that particular moment. He did not scream, he did not shout, he did not threaten anyone on the spot. He just quietly went back to his office and plotted revenge on the students. Maybe by the end, the way he harassed Charlie, was unacceptable. But any other action apart from that was completely justified.

 

77)  Ed Rooney – Ferris Bueller’s Day Off

Another principal being wrongly portrayed in a negative light. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off was even mentioned in another one of my articles of overrated Hollywood movies. The sole reason for that is because I completely disagreed with Ferris and his friends’ actions. They went completely berserk with the freedom they were granted.

The principal, Mr. Rooney was shown to be comically chasing them around the city trying to find faults so he can expose Ferris. Of course that would not happen in the real life, but even if it did, the principal would not be the one to blame.

And to some extent I also disliked Cameron’s actions. He totalled his father’s car just out of spite. You can’t really do that. If you have a disagreement with your parents, talk to them. Don’t take their car out for a spin and cause havoc around the city.

 

88) Tai Lung – Kung Fu Panda

I think this one is pretty straightforward. Anyone who has ever seen Kung Fu Panda as an adult would realise that just like Commodus from Gladiator, Tai Lung is not at fault here. It was Shifu who is to be blamed. I would not even blame Master Oogway. Master Oogway knew that Tai Lung could not handle rejection. And that was specifically the reason why he did not let him be the Dragon Warrior.

Shifu brought up Tai Lung by showing him dreams of becoming Dragon Warrior. Shifu taught him everything but humility. And to be fair, Tai Lung was not an inherent bad guy. The proof of this was given in Kung Fu Panda 4. Although the movie sucked, the only scene that proved Tai Lung’s maturity was when he bowed to Po. He was jealous of Po but when The Chameleon tells him that she’s taken the staff from Po, he would not believe it. If you look closely, he actually felt angered by it. Tai Lung was raised to be egoistic. And because Shifu made that mistake with him, he did the opposite with Tigress. Another mistake. Maybe the real villain was Shifu all along.

 

99) Killmonger – Black Panther

Over the years I feel that this is not an unpopular opinion anymore. A lot of people on the internet too believe that Erik Killmonger was far from a villain. There is a famous African proverb that goes, “The child who is not embraced by the village will burn it down to feel its warmth.”

That’s it. That is exactly what Black Panther is about. Erik Killmonger was wronged as a child. His uncle killed his father and left him alone to fend for himself. Year later he comes back to take the throne of Wakanda for himself. And the best part? He takes the throne back through a legitimate fight. No power-ups, no cheating. He beats T’Challa fair and square. Out of all the villains mentioned so far, Killmonger is the least antagonist of them all. And I did not even the mention the scene where he takes back the stolen artifacts from the museum, all the while giving them a real history lesson!

 

10) The Replicants – Blade Runner

Coming to my second favourite movie of all time which I feel is one of the most perfect movies to ever exist. Blade Runner is a genre-defining science fiction film that is not just cinema, it is art. But more on the thematic of Blade Runner later. Right now I just want to say that the Replicants were not villains. They were lost. I would like to compare them to Ronins. But a different kind of Ronin. To those of you who don’t know, a rōnin is a masterless samurai. According to the code of samurais, Bushido, if a samurai lost their master they must commit seppuku, i.e. suicide. If you don’t commit suicide and instead continue to live life as a samurai, you’d be called a rōnin. An outcast. A drifter. But what about a samurai, whose master was a tyrant? What about a samurai who wants to live his life a different way than what his master intends for him to? What about a samurai that is being hunted down by his master? Do you still call them rōnins? Nope, you call them Replicants. While it is not explicitly mentioned, a replicant’s purpose in life was ‘to live’. They wanted free will. They did not want to be Tyrell’s puppets. They did not want to be any human’s slave. So when they escaped, they became rōnins. Nothing antagonistic about that. And of course, the Tears In Rain scene proves that Replicants were more human than humans themselves.

Blade Runner is one movie I can talk for hours about. Do watch it if you are fine with slow-burn philosophical films.